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Volume 18, Issue 49;   December 5, 2018: Effects of Shared Information Bias: I

Effects of Shared Information Bias: I

by

Shared information bias is the tendency for group discussions to emphasize what everyone already knows. It's widely believed to lead to bad decisions. But it can do much more damage than that.
A set of wrenches from a toolkit

A set of wrenches from a toolkit. A well-equipped toolkit needs wrenches of every standard size. In metaphorical terms, when shared information bias takes hold in a group discussion, it has the effect of having everyone in the group provide the same size wrench for the group's toolkit.

Shared information bias is the tendency of groups to spend time and energy discussing information that most group members already know. Consequently they have less time and energy to devote to information that only a few members know. [Stasser 1985] [Van Swol 2007] [Forsyth 2010] This bias in the way the group invests its resources leads to misalignment between reality and the group's perceptions, and eventually to bad decisions.

For example, in discussing possible solutions to a technical problem, the portion of the discussion devoted to information that most group members already know will tend to be disproportionately large, in terms of importance, compared to the portion of the discussion regarding technical subtleties known only to the few group members with relevant expertise. In part, this happens because the number of people who are familiar with the commonly shared information is greater than the number of people who are familiar with the less commonly shared information. But research suggests that the shared information bias is greater than mere numbers would predict.

Although bad decisions are the most commonly cited effect of shared information bias, the damage it causes transcends the substance of the immediate decision at hand. That's why it's important to consider other effects of the bias, to motivate groups to address shared information bias with the attention it deserves.

Here, in Part I of this exploration, are four ways shared information bias harms group processes.

Members experience a false sense of comfort and well being
Repeated Shared information bias leads to
misalignment between reality and
the group's perceptions, and
eventually to bad decisions
experiences of discussions that fail to challenge group members' beliefs and preconceptions can enhance their sense of comfort and well being, however false it might be. This misapprehension of the group's actual state can expose it to great risk of chaos if it encounters a situation to which it has been rendered vulnerable by this false sense of security.
Enhanced likelihood of groupthink
Groupthink is a group-psychological dynamic that causes the group to converge on an outcome not on the basis of the tenets to which the group claims it subscribes, but instead as a means of achieving group harmony and conformity. The probability of an irrational and dysfunctional outcome is thus elevated. When groupthink is in effect, the group tries to minimize conflict and reach consensus, even at the cost of abandoning critical thinking, suppressing alternative viewpoints, and preventing access to external influence. Shared information bias thus facilitates groupthink by providing a false sense of comfort and well being and a variety of contributions that are consistent with the views and preconceptions of group members. For more about groupthink, see "Design Errors and Groupthink," Point Lookout for April 16, 2014.
Biased assessments of importance
In groups, especially in real or virtual meetings, a commonly used heuristic for assessing the importance of an idea or insight is group members' sense of the number of times it arises in discussion. People don't actually count occurrences; a subjective sense seems to be sufficient. If the group is experiencing a shared information bias, that bias skews the subjective sense of the frequency of mentions of ideas. The group members then tend to assess the importance of frequently cited ideas as greater than they might actually be. And that can skew the discussion away from directions that might reveal insights and perspective far more important than anything discussed so far.
Increased persistence of wrong beliefs
If someone withholds an incorrect opinion, misinformation, or misapprehension, that they themselves have accepted, it's less likely to be refuted by another group member who knows that the withheld contribution is incorrect, misinformed, or confused, but who doesn't know that any group members subscribe to it. And the longer the confusion remains in the mind of the holder, the longer it's available in that person's mind to discredit truthful beliefs and accurate perceptions.

We'll continue next time with five more ways in which shared information bias inflicts harm on group processes.  Next in this series Go to top Top  Next issue: Effects of Shared Information Bias: II  Next Issue

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Footnotes

Comprehensive list of all citations from all editions of Point Lookout
[Stasser 1985]
Garold Stasser and William Titus. "Pooling of unshared information in group decision making: Biased information sampling during discussion," Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 48:6 (1985), 1467-1478. Available here. Retrieved 18 November 2018. Back
[Van Swol 2007]
Lyn M. Van Swol. "Perceived importance of information: The effects of mentioning information, shared information bias, ownership bias, reiteration, and confirmation bias," Group Processes and Intergroup Relations 10:2 (2007), 239-256. Available here. Retrieved 18 November 2018. Back
[Forsyth 2010]
Donelson R. Forsyth. Group Dynamics, Fifth Edition. Belmont, California: Wadsworth, 2010, pp. 327ff. Available here. Back

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When we begin using new tools or processes, we make mistakes. Practice is the cure, but practice can be scary if the grace period for early mistakes is too short. For teams adopting new methods, psychological safety is a fundamental component of success. Available here and by RSS on December 20.

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